Calvert vrs Vellacott: The battle of dumb and dumber

Calvert vrs Vellacott: The battle of dumb and dumber

Ever since Paul Martin in his oh so infinite wisdom decided to introduce side deals for provinces on equalization our fine premier has been beating his drum about fairness for Saskatchewan. The province has been doing so well financially that for us to get more money from the federal government we would need all the cash we get from our natural resources cut out of the calculations. If Nova Scotia can get a bigger piece of the pie why can’t we?

I can understand the selfish reasons why we would do this but the whole notion irritates me. Saskatchewan has enough money. There are far better ways to boost government revenue through growth in the economy. All this bickering between the provinces and the federal government is a complete waste of time. Stop asking the federal government for stupid side deals and concentrate on managing this boom. This is dumb.

Here comes the dumber! Harper and his blue minions promised Saskatchewan that it would keep all of its natural resource cash. About 800 million dollars! There was no small print, no but ifs. When the budget was unveiled we found out all that natural resource cash will be capped at just over 200 million dollars. Premier Calvert is calling this a broken promise. He even brought out a fundraising brochure sent out in Harper’s name that promised Saskatchewan could keep “100 percent of your oil and gas revenues. No small print. No excuses. No caps.” I don’t know how anyone could convince themselves this isn’t a broken promise. Yet someone has.

Enter the white knight of truthiness: Maurice Vellacott! Who is claiming the Calvert is lying through his teeth. Instead of admitting the truth the un-caped moral crusader is flinging insults at the premier! He calls Calvert a “socialist” (unlike those far right wing New Democrats) who can’t handle economic prosperity.

It is bad enough that you are so ineffective that you can’t get your own party leader to own up to his own promises. It is bad enough that you can’t admit the plain truth that is obvious to anyone with a streak of honesty. Why go around insulting people who can be justifiably upset over a broken promise?

I’m so glad I moved out of Vellacott-land!! I saw him at the Mayor’s prayer breakfast and it took every moral fibre and shred of Anabaptist peace and non-violence resolve inside of me to not STICK OUT MY LEG AND WATCH THE GUY FALL INTO SOMEONE’S PANCAKES…but somehow, I managed. Having my wife beside me probably helped.